


Call Me Talon

by IrwinLives



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Dick Grayson Has Issues, Dick Grayson is a Talon, Earth-3, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Drug Addiction, M/M, Recreational Drug Use, bad place full of bad people
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-03-16
Updated: 2020-03-16
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:53:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,711
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23164306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/IrwinLives/pseuds/IrwinLives
Summary: Except Dick knows exactly what he could do. Dick feels the pounding fists against his sides that won’t stop until he’s a crumpled bloody mess at Owlmans feet. Thomas’s punishments hurt but at least it’s being touched; it stings but it’s better than the empty feeling Dick gets whenever he isn’t killing, or fucking, or getting high.  Maybe just maybe there is a bit of concern buried beneath Thomas’s fists falling hard and heavy. The thought sends a shiver and a wince up Dicks back.
Relationships: Dick Grayson/Jason Todd, Dick Grayson/Thomas Wayne Jr. | Owlman
Comments: 3
Kudos: 57





	Call Me Talon

**Author's Note:**

> One of those Earth-3 AU's where Dick is bad, Thomas Wayne is worse, and Jason isn't all that bad but he wants to be. All the warnings that come with Earth-3 as well as warnings for referenced drug abuse and child abuse.

Dick pulls at the tie that's knotted too close around his neck. He takes another step into the sterile hotel room before falling apart on the bed. If he had something, _something_ to take the edge off it would be so much smoother. Instead he busies himself with pulling off the suit. Trying to ignore the feeling growing inside him. 

His eyes drift down to his hands. Some blood, just a fleck of it, a bit caught underneath his fingernails. He brings it to his lips slow-like and sucks. It is all familiar iron and sweat, none of the kick, but it satisfies in its own way. 

He could get something. It’s a skeezy hotel, somebody must be selling. Of course Thomas would know. He always knows. Dicks eyes flick up for a moment scanning for the cameras before giving up. His head aches and he wonders about blowing off the hit and heading out to get wasted in some gutter. He doesn’t have a dollar in his pocket but that has never stopped him before. What could Thomas really do if he found him dirty and high instead of at a kill. 

Except Dick knows exactly what he could do. Dick feels the pounding fists against his sides that won’t stop until he’s a crumpled bloody mess at Owlmans feet. Thomas’s punishments hurt but at least it’s being touched; it stings but it’s better than the empty feeling Dick gets whenever he isn’t killing, or fucking, or getting high. Maybe just maybe there is a bit of concern buried beneath Thomas’s fists falling hard and heavy. The thought sends a shiver and a wince up Dicks back.  


He shakes his head pulling himself back up off the bed. He holds his hands before him until there is no more shake to them. Removing his tux he replaces it with the Talon suit. He catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror and all he sees is blood.

Dick makes his way through the air vents trying to think of some type of clever line to throw at the mafianars before he kills them all. He was stuck thinking about how to pun blood and marinara sauce, when he drops down into the center of the room. 

In place of a table of poker playing Italians, there were ten or so mutilated bodies. Artie Gillancio was splayed out by Dicks feat his face still looking terrified even as his eyes were cold and dead.

It wasn’t quite as messy as Dick would have done it but he appreciates the craft. His eyes slowly rise until a big hulk of _something_ was filling up his vision. A man dressed up in black and red, patiently leaning against a wall with a bloody knife in his hand. 

“Mamma mia” Dick whispered.

“Heard the owl ordered a hit. Thought I’d lend a hand.” The man reaches out to grab a dismembered arm of the floor. He throws it over. 

“I can see that.” Dick says in the tinny modulated voice of Talon. He walks over dragging his claws against the wall until he’s looking past the mask into the eyes of the man. They stare back at him, unafraid. Dick has always welcomed a challenge. 

He tries to get at Dicks neck with the knife. Dick twists to the side, launching back and throwing out a kick. It just barely misses and Dick doesn’t waste a second, lunging and throwing both of them to the ground. From there it’s an absolute mess of limbs, kicks and hits none of which fully land. Dick can feel that the man under him is stronger, but Dick is nimbler. It’s awfully even and Dick hasn’t had an even fight in a long time.

It becomes something of a dance where they struggle to get their hands on each other. He goes for a punch that changes into a grasp as the man moves away. Dick loses the upper hand and all at once he’s pinned on his back. Thomas is the only one who’s been able to pin him since he became Talon. It’s thrilling to have someone else capable of doing it. 

The knife is angled above him, in line with a weak point on the side of his armor. The man hesitates, it is less then a second, but it makes all the difference. He doesn’t go for the kill and by the time the knife comes down it barely grazes Dick’s side. He uses that momentum to swing the two of them around. 

Dick ends up on top of the man, his fingers wrapped tight around his neck. Slowly he starts squeezing tighter and tighter. The man's eyes which have until now shined confident and vicious, get angry as his oxygen supply is slowly cut off, the Talon’s claws digging into his neck. He struggles for a moment unable to break the Talons grip, until he finally chokes out “Bruce..Bruce.”

Dicks fingers still all at once, slowly he removes them from his neck. Dick hasn’t heard that code word in ages. The red masked man turns to the side, hacking and coughing. He can see the impressions his fingers made on his neck, some blood dripping from his mouth down his chin. 

“Well that was fun.” The man says once he regains his breath. He rubs a hand across his face, the split lip giving him a bloody smile. Dick studies him, he’s young he realizes all at once. At least as young as Dick, it’s clearer now when he’s not moving. 

“So, you're the new dog?” Dick says, rapidly losing interest. The same thing had happened a couple times; Owlman bringing in some new damaged killer, letting them loose on Gotham’s superheroes, and flaunting them in front of Dick just to prove that he was replaceable. The kid had a lot of skill and a lot of potential, but Dick wasn’t going to bother getting attached. He’d be around for as long as Owlman bothered to work on his new pet project, until he pissed Thomas off and ended up with a knife in the jugular. All the code word meant was Dick wouldn’t get to be the one who put him in the ground.

The boys eyes flashed. He was easy to rile up. Thomas wouldn’t like that. Dick moved from dead mobster to dead mobster, turning his back to the boy as he searched their pockets. Good old Sal had a fun little container of white powder tucked into his coat near a picture of his family. Dick rolled the picture into a tube while he set up the lines.

The kid snorted. “Drugs, really?” Dick didn’t bother responding, pulling the face off the mask, leaving only the goggles. He put a bit of the stuff on his tongue. His mouth became deliciously numb, and everything tilted out of focus for a moment. It swung back in the next, Dicks vision tunneling down into the green eyes staring at him, filled to the brim with an almost childish anger. 

“All this talk about the vicious Talon and you’re just a junkie in a metal suit.” He said spitting on the ground in front of Dick.  


If he didn’t learn how to bite his tongue, Dick realized, he wasn’t going to last a week. 

“Here’s a word of advice kid, leave now, get out of Gotham. Don’t let anyone know where you’re going. Don’t use your real name, don’t use your own money and try to live out however many days you’ve got left on some fancy island, until Owlman sends me to kill you.” Dick turned back around still itching for a hit. 

“You mean Thomas?” The boy said to the back of his head. Dick turns around to face him, still looking for a response in the bare metal Talon eyes. Dick could count on one hand the amount of people who knew Owlman was Thomas, and half of them were dead. It made this person much more and much less of a threat than Dick had initially suspected. 

“Who?” Dick said, trying to maintain a disinterested tone.

“Thomas Wayne. Rich bastard. Real musceley, likes it when you call him Daddy.” He sent Dick a cheeky smile, eyes still flaring. 

Dick pounced on him, it wasn’t a conscious thought, but a desire. He wanted to rip out the man's tongue, or gouge out those stupid eyes, that seemed to flash victoriously despite their position. Maybe carve up his pretty face and leave it mutilated and bloody. There were a lot of things he could do that wasn't kill. They struggled, but Dick didn’t let him gain any holds.  


Dick leaned forward pressing his lips against the boys ear. 

“ Here's what I’m going to do. I’m going to kill you, I'm going to take these drugs, and then I am going to get absurdly high on your corpse.” The boy struggled more furiously still obviously winded from their last fight.

Then Dick saw it, a knife gripped tightly in the kids hands. Without the bottom of the mask his throat was bare. Dick could move, he could escape, but instead he stays draped over the body, lifting his neck up invitingly. A moment passes between them while the kids eyes lock onto Dicks and his knuckles go white from gripping the knife.  
The moment ended, the boy hadn’t stabbed him. For the second time, he didn’t go for the kill. 

The knife clangs against the floor as he releases it from his grip. Dick stills, rising off him. He holds out his hand careful to sheath the claws in. 

The kid is down beneath Dick, dirty and angry, face and neck scraped up, eyes screaming with every emotion Dick constantly tries to forget. He’s young and beautiful and a part of Dick is already mourning him, hoping Dick’ll be the one to kill him, he’d make it fast. Finally he grabs Dicks hand pulling himself up off the floor. 

Dick cocks his head “So you know Thomas, what about me?” 

The boy looks at him “Your Richard Grayson.”

Dick pulls the mask off, his hair falling into his eyes. “Please,” he says, giving off an empty smile. “Call me Talon.”


End file.
